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was this too much to charge for 5 hours of babysitting?
my brother asked me to babysit this friday, I said want $10hr...for 5 hours....$50 for the day...he said im charging too much, I said u pay the daycare that....and maybe even more....the kid has to eat too....I gotta feed my niece also...well now he thinks im charging too much and said nevermind a bout keeping my niece...and now he is mad at me. am I charging him too much or are my prices just fine?
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If he were to seek professional , licensed day care, you are probably right that it might cost him about this, or even more, sadly enough. However, you are not in that category. You didn't give your age, which may also make a difference in the level of care you can provide. He doesn't need to get angry with you, however, all he needs to do is go elsewhere. I do agree with him that , for your personal babysitting, including feeding, that you are charging way too much. YOu didn't give your niece's age, either, which might make a difference in how you feed her. Cut your fee in half, and then some. If this is too low for you, you can always turn him down. If you want, you can check out what the going rates are in your community, with others your age, assuming you are not yet an adult. If you are, you might also consider asking him to give you a sum to cover her food, if its a lot, and do it without any fee at all, as a personal favor. He is your family, after all. And you aren't being asked to do this on an on-going basis, but for one small day. Be bigger about it and do it graciously, and forget about the money. It will come back to you in other ways, indeed. ~Dr. Stephanie
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When money is tight, people will look for deals on things they think they can get deals on. You are right about day-cares, he probably pays about the same or more. The problem is that people, even myself, will think of family as the only people who can do such a favor for them and charge little to nothing at all. Grandmas are hit up for watching the kiddo's and usually a Grandma, like myself, are ecstatic over the change to have the baby to themselves to ooo and ahh over for hours without considering getting paid. Then the kid grows older and its not as easy or as fun anymore. I have a granddaughter almost two who is starting to talk but she doesn't have enough words yet to talk back, however she does it plenty fine in made up baby language just cursing me out if she doesn;t get something she wants which is dangerous for her, or poisonous to eat, etc. Having her will to deal with makes it real work to babysit. I am living out of our van. So I don't have much costs and if needed and it doesn't interfere with pt work schedule and I get a call to babysit, the only thing I ask for is money to cover gas there and back because our vehicle is a gas guzzler. If you are wanting to make good money out of babysitting, then doing so for relatives is not the way to go, because the majority of relatives do it for little or no pay. It doesn't mean you are greedy or money hungry or don't care about your niece or helping your brother. I will say that if a mother was a single mother, had bad experiences with previous sitters she had or couldn't find any for pay, or she earns so little that she can't afford to pay full child care or even baby sitting for an evening, So she gets work the opposite time of her Mom so grandma watches for free when mother is at work. that is a real hardship case. I am just saying that he must be thinking also that family does it for free or for almost nothing. I guarantee he did not grow up the time i did as a teen when watching neighbors kids at night was 50 cents and hour or later 75 cents. If a person had two or three kids, it was 1.50 an hour. Moms who did daycare unofficially were doing it for real low also. A 9 hr day ended up 10. or 15 for a whole day. That is all I know, the past. I have no idea what is fair for today. I think I have heard of people charging 10 per hour, and this is teen sitters for the evening. If you give him a deal once, he'll expect it again. Best you can do is ask him what he thinks is fair. That that cost per hour and add it up and decide if it's good enough for you to do babysitting for him every time for about the same. If his offer is something for drastically less, like 2 to 5 dollars an hour, You could ask him if he thinks its so fair that he would be willing to babysit occasional someones kid for the same amount? If he says yes, you could always say that you'll hold him to it once you have kids. Or if you already do. He'll cool off in time. I think he's just mad he couldnt get it for next to nothing. Cutting corners on ones budget is of course what everyone needs to do when wages don't go up but the cost of living does. That's everywhere in this country. But remind him that daycare or babysitting is one area where you can cut corners. My horror story started when after two months, the mom in my neihborhood who was doing daycare, decided to stop cold turkey, meaning she told me when I picked up my daughter that as of tomorrow she was no longer going to do daycare anymore. Thats bad enough. The child was a year and a half. I called every official daycare in my area and none had room for any more kids under age 2. So I started calling women out of the paper, not licensed daycares. This one seemed okay so we agreed to take the kid there the following day. I had just arrived at work when my husband who was to drop her off called me to say, he never did drop her off, and needed me to come home because when he got to the place, it was surrounded by police cars and the ladys boyfriend had come over to threaten her and punched holes in her front door. Tell him that story or make up something similar because I can guarantee its happened somewhere. A teen babysitter invited friends over for a party after we left to be gone for the evening. The apt manager knew we wouldn't be okay with it, but by time she could find my husbands cell number and we got back, the only evidence of a wild party was cigarette butts in our dish ware around the apt and the fridge and cupboards raided of food. The child was sleeping peacefully with a couple of plush toys in her crib that didn't belong to us. I was pissed, I tell you and we were paying the fair rate for the time but still got a bad experience. Doesn't matter the age, teen or older person, there are few people you can really trust with your kid. And that is why so often people will also turn to relatives to sit the kids.
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